Los Angeles daily herald., 1887-10-23
WHY SIGN ONLY DEM0NYMS?
The Inquiry of "a Man who Says
John II. So. JOhn Has an Auto.
NJ,


nearly all of the people who write let
ters to the newspapers sign their com
munications with demonyms or phr
monyms."
at does seem little strange" as
sented the reporter, conservatively.
"Now, Why" continued the oh
server. settling himself in his chai
and taking vigorous pufis at his cigar
preparatory to Il few minutes Of soil,
but deliberate talking. "Why shoul,
the legion OF occasional letter
writer's, whose communications iinC
their way into newspaper columns
or newspaper waste-baskets, sticl
SO steadily and stupidity to demonyms
Why do they not oftener make use o.
an ananym, a telonism, stigmonym
syncopism, an apoconym, an aristro'
nym, an ascetonym, an astersm, or a
boustrophedonym? Why not an oc-
casional autonym? In extreme cases,
would not the reading public pardon
even an allonym, for the sake of nov
city. if for nothing else? An anagram
makes an interesting pseudonym and
alphabetisms, though they are a bit
stereotyped, are not without their
charms. In this city, bubbling over
with municipal pride, geonyms are
not rare appendages to newspaper
communications, but how seldom OH
see cryptonym, or pharmaconym
or q sideronym !"
The speaker paused Il moment and
looked solemnly at his listener.
"What is this all about ?" demanded
that amazed person in desperation.
His companion smiled broadly.
II thought I'd stagger you before l
had exhausted the category, he said
"You see, am in the act of unload
ing some inf rmation that is not alb
solutely indispensable to anybody,
but which is of sort that is t"lerably
interesting to pretty nearly everybody
1t is gathered up, by degrees, by those
persons who devote themselves to
books for love of books themselves,
rather than for desire to absorb the
learning the best books contain-book-
worms, in fact, had the book craze
for a while and learned these terms
faithfully, as one feature of
the mania, I'm not SO
much OF book-worm az I was, at least
not in the same way-but the queer
words and expressions l learned have
stayed with me and occasionally air
them as | have done just now.
"When man writes letter or a
pamphlet or hook and doesn't use
his own name-or autonym-he uses
nom-de. plume, or pseudonym. The
first term literally means 'pen-name'
and the second 'false-name,' and both
are familiar expressions. But COM
paratively few people have taken the
pains to learn that the idea expressed
by either of these two general terms
may be subdivided and expressed
more definitely by one of score or
more of words, each having peculiar
meaning. Permit me to verify my
memory with the list in my note
book.
"When one or more asterisks, or
stars, are appended, instead of a
name, like this, \ X, tine sigma
ture is an asterism. A succession of
letters, as A G, or X w, is
an alphabetism. An allonym is some
body else's name or pseudonym used
in order to deceive the reader. Some
of the stories accredited to the late
Hugh Conway most likely have al
lonyms on the title-page, whe the
real writer's name should be. An all
anym and boustr )phedonym are
identical, and signify a name written
backward. When l was boy the |
dime novel was in its glory. and u ma
jority of the pernicious little books |
were published by Munro & Co. and |
Ornum Il Co. l have never taken |
pains to verify my opinion, but l have
always thought that Ornum was bOu-
strophedonym.
"a cryptonym is the transposition of |
another-an anagram, in fact. 1t was |
much resorted to in the old English |
times, when everybody was writing |
risky political and personal pamphlets,
which they were afraid to acknowledge |
openly, but which they hoped to be
able to claim without danger some
day. An apoconym is name with
out its initials. Thus Clark would be-
come Lark, and James, Ames. An
aristonym is a title of nobility used as
a proper name, and ascetonym, or a
hagionym, is sacred name. Ex-
Governor st. John, Of Kansas, has a
natural hagionym to sign his letters
with, and st. Louis is guilty of at
to rival Chicago's great
name with an ascetonym.
zones real name is an autongm, so
the famous prohibitionist's cognOmen
is really an NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS.,
though he has probably never sus-
pected it. A demonym is a popular or
ordinary qualification used as a name,
like Amateur or Citizen or Con
slant Reader and geonym is the
same of a country, town or village, 80
used as "A Kansas Cityzan.'
"The initials of a writer's real name
form an initialism. and a sarcastic
signature is an ironym. Patiently
Awaiting signed to complaint
against the garbage collectors is an
ironym. A phrase, like "A Lover OF
Justice, is a phraseonym, but moral
quality expressed in word like Jus.
titia,' is a phrenonym. The same OF
a substance or material, used for a
signature, is pharmaconym and an
astronomical name is a sideronym.
Quality or title expressed in sigma
t,lre is a titlonym, as 'An Alderman
and anality or title falsely assumed |
is psendo-titlonym. So, the use of
false initials is pseudo-initialism.
"Pseudandry is the term expressing |
the signing OF mans name by a
woman, as when Miss Murfree |
assumed Charles Egbert Craddock'
for pen-name. When man assumes
a woman's name, the act is pseudonyn.
Syncopism is the use of dots or stars
instead of some OF the letters of a
name. Signing the terminal letters
of your name is a telonism and such
signature is telonym. A scenonym
is stage name. A translationym is
a translation of the real name. The
Rev. j. q. Wood once availed himself |
- :. I,-...,....t , al {,